conference just a short time ago. >> an individual came into terminal 3 of this airport, pulled a assault rifle out of a bag and began to open fire in the terminal. he proceeded up into the screening area, where tsa screeners are, and continued shooting, and went past the screeners back into the airport itself. personnel officers from airport police, los angeles airport police, responded immediately to the calls. they tracked the individual through the airport, and engaged him in gunfire in terminal 3. and were able to successfully take him into custody. >> nbc news justice correspondent, pete williams, joins me now with the latest on the investigation. pete, i understand we have

learned breaking news with the suspect. what do you know? >> reporter: well, authorities from several different organizations have told us that the suspect's name is paul anthony ciancia. c-i-a-n-c-i-a. they say he is 23 years old, born in february of 1990. a u.s. citizen who is living in the l.a. area. and as for the motive -- we're a long way from knowing that for certain. there is some indication, we're told, that he had strong anti-government views. that's based on some written material that we're told he was carrying, that they found on him after he was shot by l.a. airport police. he is said to be in critical condition at the ucla medical. we believe that all of the people who were shot, all of the people he shot, were employees of the it tsa. one of whom was killed, three of whom were wounded, with varying degrees of severity of their injuries. but that he didn't shoot anyone

else. one telling thing is what a witness said, who talked earlier today to msnbc, who said that the witness was approached by the gunman who said, do you work for the tsa. so it would seem to be a combination of anti-government views and some kind of grudge against the tsa. now, there had been some initial reporting from some news organizations that this suspect had a connection to the tsa. that was perhaps an off-duty or former employee, but these federal officials we've talked to all say that's not the case. they have found no indication that this person had had any connection with the tsa. no indication that we can find that this person was on any kind of known list of people with strong anti-government views. none of the groups that track these organizations say that they have heard of him. he was not on any kind of federal watch list or database or list of names of people that

have known anti-government views. so what his motives were, when he got the weapon, that's going to be answered in the days to come. >> and pete, could you just explain once again why authorities believe he might -- or it's being sort of out there that he had anti-government views? i think you said -- >> based strictly -- >> writings on his person? >> that's all they have at this point. it's going to take a long time now, many hours, perhaps days, to get a good answer to what was going on. they haven't searched his house yet. they have to get a search warrant for that. this is what he was carrying. we're told he had some written materials in his possession when he was found at the airport, after they shot him. that expressed strong anti-government views. >> great. nbc's pete williams, thank you very much. >> you bet. >> nbc's miguel almaguer is on the ground in l.a. and joins me now. miguel, we heard a little bit of that press conference a short

time ago. where are we with the scene there? i imagine it's still rather chaotic? >> reporter: certainly. we know at least three terminals, terminal 1, 2 and 3 are shut down at this hour. in fact, all three are over my left shoulder there. over the last hour or so, we have seen police cars screaming down this region, going right up into l.a.x. so we know there is still a very active investigation under way. there have been dozens and dozens of spectators here outside l.a.x. we're about 100 yards away from the very front entrance to l.a.x. they're not allowing the public to go beyond the police barricade or the media, for that matter, just to our -- to my right-hand side. so we know it's a very active scene here. many folks out here. we have seen passengers who have been wheeling their carry-on and their checked luggage down this walkway, walking at least blocks, if not a mile or so, to reach a cab or a car outside of the airport. we know there have been people who have asked us, are we allowed to go into the airport at this hour. so certainly a lot of confusion out here. and as was mentioned, this is

one of the busiest airports in all of the nation. l.a., this region, is a huge hub, not just for los angeles, but all of southern california. there is a lot of connecting flights here, chaos and confusion still persists even hours after the shooting. >> miguel, could you tell us once again, is the airport -- is the airport open again? or are flights taking off and landing again? >> reporter: there certainly are three terminals, at least three terminals still open at this hour. we have seen flights take off and a few land over the last hour or so. at one point after the shooting, there was -- the flights were shut down for some time, but they have resumed at this hour. we have seen flights taking off and landing. there are still several news choppers overhead. seven overhead, as well as a police helicopter, and a firefighting helicopter who were in this region as a precaution. but, yes, the airport has remained open. obviously, it is very limited aon the flights, several delays and cancellations throughout the day. we expect there will be a ripple effect, not just here at l.a.x.,

but other major airports across the region. >> nbc's miguel almaguer, thanks very much. while we are learning the first details of the suspected gunman today, we are also getting firsthand accounts of those who encountered the man face-to-face. i want to go -- >> he was calm, he was walking slowly. he must have felt he was in control, because he had his weapon, and, you know, nobody else did at that time. and i was cowering in a corner and when he confronted me, so -- you know, but for the grace of god, i would have been one of the fatalities. >> and he asked you if you were tsa. >> caller: that's all he said. all he said was "tsa?" just like that. >> i want to go now to retired special agent jim cavanaugh. jim, that's a chilling clip. what does that tell you about the type of suspect we could be dealing with here? >> well, jonathan, if you add that with what pete williams

reported, that on his body there was some anti-government writings, you know, that gives you pause. was he targeting tsa or, you know, federal employees. but, you know, it's hard to tell right now. because at an airport, he could see the tsa as people that are in his way. the tsa officers wear light blue police-style uniform. they have a badge. and so if he comes to the airport, even if he's got anti-government views, he might have some fantastical plot that he's going to hijack an aircraft. he doesn't have a ticket, but he does have a rifle. he may view the tsa as people in his way. so he shoots them at the checkpoint and then bypasses the check point. everybody scatters in the terminal, as you heard from the witnesses. and one man who sort of hid that you just played the clip, and the shooter says to him, "tsa." again, you know, is he targeting tsa, or does he see tsa as, you

know, agents in his way? so we don't know that quite yet. was he going to continue on into the terminal? and you know, try to get on an aircraft? you know, the plot won't necessarily make sense. but we just don't really have what he decided he was going to do. the mission seems somewhat suicidal. if he was just going to shoot everybody at the -- all the tsa agents. or was he going to try to get on an aircraft. >> hey, jim, i want to go back to something that pete williams reported, and i think you also mentioned, that the gunman was found to have anti-government materials on him. do you have any insights into what those materials might say? how would authorities glean the fact that this -- the suspect had anti-government leanings. >> any writings he had, could have been on his cell phone,

phone, could have had writings bashing the government, attacking leadership in the government. agencies of the government. you know, people hear this talk constantly on the airways. it's become almost a sickness they talk about -- the way they talk about the government. and young people pick this stuff up. some of them are mentally ill. some of them are just, you know, not mentally ill, but sort of lunatic conspiracy crazy. and they get this kind of constant talk all of the time, and then they sort of try to live it out. so it's going to be interesting. we have sovereign citizens, militia members, anti-government zealot zealots. all kinds of crock pots and i'm not talking about the mentally ill. i'm talking about conspiracy people who aren't mentally ill, that's a different kind of person. but people who oh believe in these fantastical plots. as pete reported, that will unfold in the hours ahead. they'll search his house, talk to neighbors, friends, associates.

and it will be posted, jonathan. it will be posted on his computer. it will be posted somewhere what he was going to do. and that will maybe give us a few answers to what was up. >> right. as you've said and as pete williams has said, we will learn a whole lot more in the days ahead. jim cavanaugh, thanks very much. >> thanks, january thon. coming up, more on today's deadly shooting at l.a.x., just the latest episode of one nation under the gun. ♪ verizon innovators are combining a network of underwater sensors and artificial reefs

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we are following developing news at this hour. a lone suspect entering los angeles international airport and opening fire. the terrifying situation unfolded earlier this morning with multiple victims shot. the airport evacuated, flights

grounded. the situation that law enforcement officials say is always at the front of their minds. >> not more than three weeks ago, we took every one of our officers, our patrol officers, and a couple hundred officers from the los angeles police department, and we practiced the exact scenario that played out today. we played out today. and i was talking to the officers involved in this particular incident a few minutes ago. and they said that that training was critical to how they responded to this. >> joining us now, heather mcgee, vice president of demos.org, and msnbc contributor, james patterson. welcome to you both. james, a person takes an assault rifle into a very public place and starts shooting. this is all way too familiar, isn't it? >> you know, i was just talking to our camera operator here about this, and i was asking her, how many times have we been in this situation, where we're getting ready to come on -- those of us who cover the news media, this is all-too-familiar,

dejavu all over again, trying to cover a story, unfolding, there is a shooting, victims, we're trying to figure out the profile of the shooter, trying to figure out who the victims are, trying to figure out motives. we just have done this too much. and this is just over the last six to eight months. >> right. >> i mean, we have to at a certain point stop and take stock of the fact there is something very, very wrong with the regularity of these occurrences. and we can do all the kinds of things, talk about the profiling, why they did it, so on and so forth. but at the end of the day, comes back to gun control, common sense gun safety, mental health, comes back to what kind of society do we live in and what kind of society do we want to live in. >> you know, heather, james talks about we'll find out what the motives were, and things like that. but what -- one thing we'll find out is, what will the gun lobbyists say about something like this? will the gun lobbyists say we should now arm all tsa agents? >> yeah, probably. probably. i think there are a lot of things we can take from this

moment, right? we have to -- in effect, because we have said we aren't going to do anything politically about this, it is unfortunate, but we have to actually take every moment that this happens to keep trying to build pressure for reform. and i think one of the things that's new about this case, what's going on with this anti-government sentiment. i often think about how so many of these shootings require public servants, whether they're teachers or firefighters or police officers, to be at the front lines. and now we have tsa people. and so we really have to think about how we treat and respect our public servants in this country. and how anti-government sentiment is at the top of our political system right now, and it's dangerous. >> hey, james, a recent politico article suggested that the white house may start pushing for gun control, more at the state level. what do you think it takes to win there at the state level? >> well, i think that's where it's trickiest. i honestly believe we need

federal legislative leadership in order to apply the pressure that's required at the state level. but i don't think we should scrap going to the state level. so, for example, at the municipal level, city level, we often have fairly robust common sense gun safety in cities like los angeles, cities like new york. but because the suburbs and other areas of those states have more lax gun safety measures and gun control and more lax background check policies in place, people can use straw purchases and other ways to sort of circumnavigate the system. the entire gun show loophole is just indicative of what happens more broadly in terms of how people get their hands and get access to weapons, even in places where municipalities have done what they're supposed to do in terms of common sense gun safety. so thinking about it at the level of the statute does address some of those issues where people are using these suburban loopholes to get access to guns and situations where they may or may not. remember, there is a whole other narrative of instances of gun violence that occurs in our

inner cities that's quite different from these things that we sen sensationalize. >> in its latest filing, the nra said had it had almost $11 million on hand and it's going to take some big bucks to win any gun control argument. >> i'm really glad you bring that up. because, i mean, we need to look at the campaign finance reform system. i was thinking, what could the president do on this? maybe push for campaign finance reform and actually at the state level. look what happened in colorado. you know, the site of aurora and also columbine. really common sense gun safety regulations. and two of the state legislators -- most people in their districts had no idea who they were. and suddenly we had over $3 million being spent from outside spending. including from the nra, which gets so much money from gun manufacturers. we really are going to have -- keep having these distortions in our democracy until we reform the campaign finance system. >> james, i want your view on that. what do you think of that? >> i agree with heather completely here that some of --

if you're concerned about the overinfluence or potential for groups like the nra to intervene in our policy processes and elections in ways that seem unfair, that gets back to campaign finance reform, that gets back to things like citizens united and honestly, remember, the nra is less about the second amendment and more about gun manufacturers. it's really driven by people who sell guns to other people, and if you think about that, that's where it gets really sick. so i agree, at the state level, one way we may address this is through campaign finance reform, which is to say we could limit the ways in which groups like the nra can essentially control our electoral system. they're controlling our electoral system around usually win issue. and that's sort of an abusive way of thinking about the second amendment. so there is a lot of ways of skinning this apple. it's about health care, campaign reform, about understanding the role and the power of the nra in terms of legislation. and we have to fight the battle on all fronts. and although we might be getting

exhausted in the media, i think heather is also right, we should take each of these opportunities to readdress the ways in which we can handle the situation from a real holistic perspective. >> and unfortunately, it seems like we're going to have yet down the road another opportunity to have this conversation again. heather mcgee, professor james peterson, thank you both. coming up, we will shift our focus back to politics, and as if we needed to tell you, there's something about hillary. ♪ ♪ ♪ hey [ male announcer ] when we built the cadillac ats from the ground up, to be the world's best sports sedan... ♪ ...people noticed. ♪ something like a phenomenon, baby ♪ ♪ you're something like a phenomenon ♪ [ male announcer ] the cadillac ats, 2013 north american car of the year.

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everywhere, every single day. so let me ask you... what's in your wallet? see who does good work and compare costs. it doesn't usually work that way with health care. but with unitedhealthcare, i get information on quality rated doctors, treatment options and estimates for how much i'll pay. that helps me, and my guys, make better decisions. i don't like guesses with my business, and definitely not with our health. innovations that work for you. that's health in numbers. unitedhealthcare. we will continue to follow any developments in today's deadly shooting at l.a.x., but we want to turn our attention back to politics. with women's reproductive rights diminished due to court rulings in texas and washington, d.c., hillary clinton used a speech this afternoon before the

pennsylvania conference for women to highlight reproductive rights as one of the many struggles facing this nation. >> to stand together, despite what we see happening in many places in the country, and defend the right of women to all the health care services that they need and deserve. >> while the appeals court in washington today upheld the challenge to the portion of the nation's health care law, mandating coverage of birth control, it is the ruling in texas that continues to grab the most attention. the appeals court there enabled the state to enforce strict regulations about who may perform abortions. effectively closing up to a third of the clinics in the state. joining us now, joan walsh, an editor at large for salon.com, and an msnbc political analyst. joan, let me read you how the appeals court judge in the d.c. ruling not so impartially referred to the nation's health care law. quote, that behemoth, known as the affordable care act, it's

not just a candidate who seems preordained, it seems like it's also the issues. >> yeah, these women's issues -- reince priebus is going to have to go back to his autopsy of an autopsy -- >> forgot about the autopsy. >> yeah, the autopsy says they can't go on turning women into democrats and that's what they have done. in the whole of 2013, these issues come back and they continue to be championed by republicans. and you know, let's point out, this is the very court where the senate just filibustered the president's nomination and called it court packing for him to have the appointments and the number of justices -- judges that other presidents have is suddenly court-packing. so they are really continuing on to make 2014 and 2016, again, the years of the women, the years of the women candidates and the years of the women voters. with really extremists and strident behavior. >> you jumped to it a bunch of things i want to get to. let's talk about rick perry, who still has dreams of the white house and has said about the

texas ruling -- let me read this to you. the decision, quote, affirms our right to protect both the unborn and the health of women of -- women of texas. anyone who runs for the gop nomination is going to have to embrace this position. and the party must know that the culture -- the culture war issues hurt them. so why do they keep doing this? >> because this is what they believe. maybe you have to give them a little bit of credit for that. on these issues, this is what they believe. and they believe that there is a silent majority out there that supports them, with no evidence. but they continue to push these things, because it turns out, certainly in the red districts, these kinds of things do help them. but in the big states, and, you know, we're going to get to see in texas, wendy davis is going to make this issue -- the center of her campaign. it already is. she is good on other issues, too, but she is banking on texas republican women saying enough is enough. and we're going to see that in other states. >> so you mention earlier about how republicans are

filibustering presidents nominee to the d.c. circuit court of appeals, and as we know today the court has upheld the legal challenge to the mandate of birth control. msnbc's adam soris has succin succinctly summarized the opinion. quote, corporations have religious beliefs too, my friends. so what happens if conservatives successfully expand the definition of corporate person hood? >> it's a very bad thing for american women. corporations are people, women, not so much. that's the take-away. today. you know, this -- this is bad news for women, but ultimately, it's going to be bad news for republicans, because they are, as you said, make sure the culture war is not over. and these are the issues that are driving women out to vote. >> now, just as a bit of an aside, on this issue of the filibustering of the president's nominee, when we went through this, when the nation went through this earlier in the spring or summer, a deal was worked out. >> right. >> in the senate to allow a whole bunch of the president's

held-up nominees to go through. now folks are actually talking about the so-called nuclear option again to get this court nominee through and some other folks through. do you think that that is something that the senate -- the senate democrats should actively consider? >> i do. i absolutely do. i mean, you know, it's so dangerous that we have a republican party that no longer believes in the legitimacy of democrats winning elections. so that when you have democratic presidents, they're tied up in knots, they're impeached. and in this situation, the filibuster has been used to basically tie our president's hands and block appointments that should be routine. you know, they blocked a very centrist judge. barack obama is not nominating, part of why ruth bader ginsburg stays on the court, she knows he will never nominate of his own volition a liberal because he captain get somebody like her through the confirmation process anymore. >> we can't talk about hillary clinton without talking about the darling -- well, depending who you talk to -- of the

republican party. and that's chris christie. today we learned from excerpts of the forthcoming 2012 sequel to game change that mitt romney's nickname for christie was puffer fish. and however -- here's why team romney decided against using christie -- tapping christie as vp. quote, the dossier on the garden state governor's background was littered with potential land mines. how electable is the supposedly electable, chris christie? >> i think there is a lot there for journalists to be pawing over in the years to come. and it does -- he seems to be walking to re-election. this may make democrats wish they had dug a little deeper and given barbara buono help in her race. democrats have helped declare him the electable one too. so, you know, there's lots to talk about when it comes to chris christie. and it's very early. >> well, we'll have plenty of time, joan. >> yes, we will. >> joan walsh from salon. thank you very much. >> thanks, jonathan. >> coming up, the end of the end of debate, finally, after all

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senate majority leader harry reid has set a vote for monday on legislation that would protect the lgbt community from workplace discrimination. to talk about it, joining us now is representative mark pocan, democrat of wisconsin, and chris geitner, legal editor at buzzfeed.com. the bill in the senate is called the employment and nondiscrimination act and bars companies with more than 15 employees from discriminating against workers on the basis of their sexuality or sexual orientati orientation. and joe manchin of west virginia was the last holdout among the democrats. he's now on board. two republicans, collins of maine and kirk of illinois, are also on board. and then there is hope that three other republicans, hatch, murkowski and portman, may also support this bill. and if they do, that would give harry reid a filibuster proof majority to move this thing forward on monday. so, chris, do you think that will happen? >> yeah, i don't think that

senator reid would have called the vote unless he knew he had the 60 votes in this instance. this is legislation that he has been holding for a while. it passed out of the senate health education labor and pensions committee earlier this summer. and he said they would bring it to the floor when he thought that they had the votes. so i think -- i mean, you've got the 60 there, and there are a couple other republicans that -- advocates have been pushing. >> congressman pocan, you're an original spokesperson of the house version but the odds of it passing in the house aren't very strong. here is texas republican louie gohmert why he opposes and take a listen. >> it also means that christian schools would be forced to hire openly homosexual individuals, and it's kind of tough to teach biblical principles in romans 1 in a school if you are of a

persuasion of being homosexual. >> now congressman, the religious exemption clause is fairly broad. so would it really force people to hire openly gay teachers, as we just heard? >> the law has been crafted, you know, very carefully to make sure that one, we're protecting people who are gay or lesbian, bisexual, transgendered, but also respect the first amendment rights of religious institutions. i think it's crafted in a way to pass the senate and our job then is to try to get it to pass the house, as well. but it's far past time and i think some of the rhetoric you'll hear from members will not be based on the law, but based on rhetoric. and that's all they're going to have. >> chris, as you write today in buzz feed, it has not had a vote in the senate since 1996. so how significant do you think -- do you think that is? >> well, i think that obviously oh, we have seen a sea change of the country's view of how these

issues are to be looked at. and the fact that this legislation, that one of the biggest problems that this legislation has is that most americans think it's already law. and so when you're starting from that point, it gets more and more difficult to really get the momentum, to get the bill to be pushed, and the advocates of enda are hoping that this senate vote can do that. >> congressman, even though the supreme court struck down doma, the defense of marriage act on june 26th, there is still members of the national guard who are being discriminated against. in fact, there are nine states which refuse to comply with the supreme court ruling against doma. and the secretary of defense put those states on notice last night. take a listen. >> everyone who serves our country in uniform, everyone in this country, should receive all the benefits they deserve, and they have earned and in

accordance with the law. everyone's rights must be protected. >> congressman, secretary hagel also says he's ready to take further action to bring those nine red states into compliance. what do you think of that? >> well, it's the directive from their military leader. they should follow it. and make sure that we don't discriminate in the national guard. so i'm hopeful. in fact, very hopeful that will happen. i think it's important to note, jonathan, that when chris mentioned part of the problem we have had so far on enda, two-thirds of the people in the country support enda. over 50% of republicans think it's -- i think it's 56%, support enda. it's just some of the problem has been people don't think right now you can discriminate against gays and lesbians, but you can in 29 states and even more for transgendered people. so this is really important to do, whether we take care of it within the national guard, through a federal directive or the law that needs to happen. this is important oh, and i think our real barrier has been that most people assume it's in place because they have supported it and it makes common

sense to not discriminate. >> chris, real fast. the state of texas has said it will not give spousal i.d. cards to same-sex couples. what can chuck hagel do to make texas and the other eight states change their ways? >> one of the issues that was raised when chris johnson from the "washington blade" asked about this was the fact that the federal government does fund a lot of the state national guard programs. and so there is that funding string they're going to be able to point to. and there is the fact that the national guard is -- can be run by the federal government in certain aspects. and hagel made clear that they are going to push for the states that have thus far refused to issue i.d. cards to do so. >> all right. and with that, congressman mark pocan and chris geitner, thanks very much. coming up, a note from the white house and some delicate

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to help you retire your way... with confidence. that's what ameriprise financial does. that's what they can do with you. ameriprise financial. more within reach. earlier today the white house welcomed one of america's more troubled allies. iraqi prime minister neuro yell maliki. less than two years after the withdrawal of u.s. troops, maliki is in washington asking for military aid as iraq teters once again on the brink of civil war. the country is in the midst of its bloodiest year since 2008 with nearly 7,000 lives claimed by sectarian violence. shortly after his meeting with the iraqi prime minister, the president reiterated his support for the iraqi government, but also called for a more inclusive iraq. the president also took a question about the shooting at l.a.x. >> obviously, we've been monitoring, and we're concerned about it.

but i'll let the law enforcement folks talk about it directly. >> coming up, rand paul and one big footnote in mouth moment. that is the subject of today's top lines. i started part-time, now i'm a manager.n. my employer matches my charitable giving. really. i get bonuses even working part-time. where i work, over 400 people are promoted every day. healthcare starting under $40 a month. i got education benefits. i work at walmart. i'm a pharmacist. sales associate. i manage produce. i work in logistics. there's more to walmart than you think. vo: opportunity. that's the real walmart. why would i take one pepcid® when i could take tums® throughout the day when my heartburn comes back? 'cause you only have to take one...

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from mountains to mole hills to plajerrists. here are today's top lines. somebody loves you. >> we reported on this show a speech a senator gave in virginia appeared to have been partly plagiarized. >> you borrowed lines from the movie. >> in the movie "gattaca," in the not too distant future, u generalics is common. >> senator paul did the same thing, with a movie "stand and deliver." >> it's a disagreement on how

you footnote things and i think people footnote things different in an academic paper. >> do you understand the words that are coming out of my mouth? >> but if we were to present any of these speeches for publication that have footnotes in, a lot of times people don't take time to footnote things. >> two clear cases of plagiarism from a sitting u.s. senator. >> i didn't claim i created the movie "gattaca." >> not the situation you want to be having farce 2016 conversations are concerned. >> i wish you would stop saying that. >> rand paul is not a plaj arrestist. he is the junior united states senator from kentucky. >> it's making a mountain out of a mole highly hill. >> maybe he doesn't understand what plagiarism is. >> justify because he and wikipedia use the same words, rand paul is a plaj rift. >> the original lines he copied

were about eugenics. >> will we have the strength of character to resist a world where eugenics is practiced voluntarily. >> no one is saying eugenics are coming. >> this is really about information and attacks coming from haters. ♪ remember only god could judge ya ♪ ♪ forget the haters 'cuz somebody loves ya ♪ >> let's get right to our panel, msnbc contributor, jimmy williams, host of the majority report and ring of fire radio, sam sater. and republican strategist, hogan giddily. thanks for being here. i want to start with the question of plagiarism. this isn't the first or second time senator paul has been accused of this. you remember when joe biden was caught plagiarizing in 1987. it took about a decade for the stigma to really go away. how serious is the accusation of plagiarism on rand paul's political future.

>> it's certainly a pock on his house, if you will, his political house. do i think he can recover from it? certainly. joe biden is now the vice president of the united states. so there are greener pass tours after you steal lines from other people. but my bigger problem here isn't that rand paul did this. my bigger problem is that his staff probably wrote this speech and that's just shoddy staff work. i worked in that building for almost seven years and thank goodness we didn't have wikipedia back in the dark ages when i worked in the senate because had we, i would have been tempted. but anybody in their right mind understands half of what you read on wikipedia isn't true. and so to quote it is foolish. and he went up and read it. so it's his staff's fault but his fault for reading it, frankly. >> and more interesting than stealing the words from wikipedia, what the words actually were. why is he talking about eugenics? >> i think what rand paul has is

a problem squaring a circle between his so-called libertarian values and his need to appeal to the christian right. to win a presidential primary. and so he's got to get there through a back door in some ways. he doesn't want to talk about, you know -- he wants to talk about personal sovereignty except for when it comes to women. and that's why he goes off on this eugenics thing. that's a problem that's going to dog him for years, i think. >> hogan, rand paul and ted cruz battle -- continue to battle for the extreme right of the republican party. but aren't we looking at the same situation we saw in 2012, where the far right and more moderate right have an all-out battle in the primary and leaves the nominee too weak to actually win the general? >> way off from having that strategic conversation, i'll be honest. these people are going to have their little skirmishes between now and then. they're already calling people out by name, which i think is a huge mistake. these types of things, though, when you're talking about running a presidential campaign and you're talking about starting it now, you're going to

have to answer questions like why you plagiarized something. you're going to have to answer questions about things your dad said, rick santorum had to answer questions about his wife's book. mike huckabee had to answer questions about scripture. bill clinton had to answer questions about his brother. these are the types of things when you run for president, they seem silly on the state level. these are things that they could get around their state and navigate the media and brush it under the rug. but when you get to the presidential level, and i've said this many times. there is no stage bigger and no lights burn hotter than when you're on that presidential stage. and you've got to answer those questions not once, but thousands of times. in those early primary states. >> and speaking of things your daddy says, jimmy, another factor that could work against ted cruz is his father continuing to make controversial remarks. a new tape recently surfaced of raphael cruz talking about setting the president back to kenya. so jimmy, how detrimental is it to have someone like that on the campaign trail for you, and does the extreme right eat this stuff up? >> well, yeah, of course they love it. that's playing to the base.

the far right sector of the base. but i had a lunch discussion today with some friends of mine. they're hill staffers. and i posed to the table, listen, what do you think about ted cruz's dad? i mean, do you think he's fair game? and every single staffer, every one of them said to a t, family is usually off limits, unless they put themselves into the political process. rafael cruz is putting himself into the political process every single time he goes out and stumps for his son. he went to the conservative coalition, whatever the heck that thing was called, did this. he's now saying the president should go back to kenya. his son gives the same stump speech virtually every single time, which is i'm here because of my father, my father is blah, blah, blah. and so he is putting his father front and center politically. if that's the case -- again, i'm generally for keeping family out of it. but if you're going to insert yourself into it, then you're fair game. and if you want to do that, then i'm going call you a berther. >> the fellows at the table are nodding in agreement.

hogan has been chomping at the bit to get in there. >> he's right. i talked earlier about having to answer for. it's not just that ted cruz's dad is out giving speeches. jimmy touched on it. ted cruz points to his father as a role model. he uses him in speeches to try and gain favor to talk about his tough upbringing, his conservative roots. that's all fair game. again, it might be silly and nonsensical to many. to some. but the fact, the political reality is, you're going to have to answer those questions, as dumb or silly as they seem. that's just part of the process. that's what makes it so difficult. >> sam. >> yeah, and it's also -- i mean, aside from the irony that, you know, you've got a guy who is a cuban national with a son from canada talking about a president going back to a country that he was -- he's not from. but, yeah, the bottom line is, ted cruz has put his father out there as being essentially his intellectual guru. and you hear the rest of that speech, it gets -- it arguably even gets worse. he's talking about that president obama is a secret

marxist. that's why he can't say the words "under god" in the pledge of allegiance as if it would met him. i mean, this bizarre stuff. and this guy raised him, and ted cruz credits him with his political outlook. and so i think, of course, it's fair game. >> you know, jonathan, can i gist say something real quickly? >> really fast, jimmy. >> if hillary clinton runs for president, which we all assume she is, will we in the media hold bill clinton to the same regard? that's an excellent question we need to think about. >> we all agree, jimmy. that is a good question. jimmy williams, sam sater, ed hogan, thank you all. we'll be right back. but first, a word of good luck for the departing director of this broadcast, ms. gina fellows. gina is the founding director of the martin bashir show, and has done so much for this network over the past eight years. we wish her, her husband jason, and their adorable son, ethan, only the best. thanks, gina. as a business owner, i'm constantly putting out fires.

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an update for you on today's top story. a gunman with an assault rifle shooting his way through security at los angeles international airport, killing a tsa worker and wounding several hours. we now know his name. paul anthony ciancia. the 23-year-old was shot by law enforcement, and taken into custody in critical condition. his motive is as yet unclear, but sources tell nbc news that they believe he had anti-government views, based on written materials he was carrying. it's not known if he was targeting tsa workers, but one witness told nbc news that the gunman passed and asked if he worked for the tsa. as the shooting unfolded. still, many more